Steve and I were debating forever if we were going to throw the boys’ a birthday party this year. As fun as they are, they are lots of work! We kept it to family and some of Max and Loggie’s best friends. We didn’t do a themed birthday like previous years. The loose “theme” was “Everything Max and Loggie Love”. Included was everything they loved eating, such as Oreos and popcorn, donuts and even cookie monster made an appearance. We wanted everything bright and colourful, essentially, fun! I did end up doing a dessert table and a cake (c’mon it’s me we’re talking about here). The dessert table may look impressive but it was very easy to set up with a lot of store bought items, just spruced up.

Dessert table: Here are a few ideas for your next party!

Oreo cookies dipped in chocolate and dunked in sprinkles.

Cookie Monster Macarons – This item is more of a specialty item. You can find your local Macaron maker and see if they will make a specialty kind. Or give it a go yourself with my tutorial here.

Birthday Cake Popcorn – Max and Logan love popcorn, this birthday cake version was a special treat! Recipes here and here.

Shortbread Dino Print Cookies – I used this recipe here (without the earl grey tea). I took a toy dinosaur and stamped its feet into the cookie before baking.

Store bought Timbits (donut holes), put them on a lollipop stick, dip in chocolate, dip in sprinkles. It was a favorite!

Little party cups filled with mini chocolate chip cookies and m&ms.

Cheesecake pots – Used this recipe, these pots can be made a couple days in advance, top with cherry the morning of the party and voila!

Decor: I used a lot of items we already had in our house to decorate the table. It was more of a rustic theme. Here are some decor ideas that are a bit more subdued but still kid friendly.

Toy Dinosaurs: I had them scattered here and there on the table for visual interest.

Tree cookies that we borrowed from my sister. Gave the table a more rustic edge and were neutral.

Dollar store stems of leaves. I cut them up and placed it around the tree cookies giving off a jungle, rustic vibe.

Wooden crates as risers to add height and dimension. I flipped them upside down and placed whatever I wanted on top.

Mason Jars, continuing the rustic theme.

Viola! Use what you have and make it work!

Entertainment
To keep the children entertained we rented a single bouncy castle for 5 hours and that alone kept the kids (mostly toddlers) happy for the entire party. Who doesn’t love a bouncy castle? Max and Logan still talk about it! We also had a piñata and lots of balloons to throw and kick around. We opened our sand pit with buckets and had water balloons as backup.

Food

To keep it simple, we had two camp coolers left out, one with adult drinks and one filled with water and juice boxes.

The main was a Taco/burrito bar. We smoked shredded pork shoulder and barbecued tex mex beef flank for the protein. There was a table with all of the fixins: shredded cheese, shredded lettuce, onions, grilled veggies, bell peppers and onions, Pico do Gallo, Peach and strawberry salsa, tortilla wraps and various hot sauces for everyone to assemble their own plate.

I also made a half a batch of Pioneer Woman’s Queso Blanco, threw it into a crockpot and had a bags of tortilla chips. This was my favorite food item! So so so good! Who doesn’t love melted cheese?!

Party Favorurs
For treat bags, we didn’t go with a “bag”, it was more of a treat jar. Continuing with our theme, we had mason jars filled with the following items Max and Loggie love.

A toy dinosaur

Two packaged Oreo cookies

A individual pack of fruit gummies

Avengers and Peppa Pig Tattoos

A mini container of PlayDoh

Starburst and Rocket candy to fill gaps

A toy car

We used a mason jar as a container because it kept with our theme and parents could re use the jar again!

And of course that day was so busy I forgot to take a picture of one!

Cake I have been baking semi professionally for years. So no matter how big or small a birthday is, there will always be a cake made by me. This year to keep with the theme of “everything they love”, I made a cake with just that: everything they love. I kept the colors light but bright and all the elements on the cake are all the things Max and Loggie care about in the world. 🙂 So some trivia below for anyone who is interested!

Blue bus: They scream “blue bus” EVERYTIME there is an ETS bus around

Dump trucks: Because, well, boys.

A green shower cap: Loggie has an odd obsession with shower caps

A bowl of random stuff: Max will make “soup” every night, he puts fake food into a bowl with a specific silver spoon and then puts it next to him to sleep…weird. We know.

Peppa Pig: Their current favorite.

Logan’s blankie: Because he will have this to the end of time.

Minions, Buzz Lightyear: Because they’re like every other kid.

Orange and Banana: Loggie and Max’s favorite fruit, respectively.

Happy Meal box: Clearly, we eat there tooooo much.

An elephant: Logan’s favorite animal

Two JellyCat bunnies: Max can’t sleep without them.

Chocolate drip on the pastel cake as a subtle homage to Ice Cream which is their favorite food group. 😉

And there you have the cake that means so much to me!

That was their party this year. I swear it was only family and a handful of their best friends and I still went slightly overboard haha. Next year, Chuck-E-Cheese and call it a day! 🙂

Hope this gave you some ideas for your own birthday party! Team Wonger hopes you have any amazing celebration!

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